Deadline to return notarized petitions on referring Lawrence County’s Zoning Ordinance’s 24-05 Changes

The 18th of December is the deadline to return the notarized petitions with signatures, to the organizers of petition drive (who will deliver the set to the County). The referendum petition, would refer Lawrence County’s recent Zoning Ordinance’s 24-05 .

Organizers have to return the cluster of notarized petitions to the County by COB on Dec 20th. Circulators wanted an extra few days to xerox and organize petitions and/or inspire a last minute push, if not enough signatures have been gathered by the 18th.

Ordinance’ 24-05 approved changes to Lawrence County’s Zoning Ordinance to place Conditional Use Permit (CUP) approvals under the appointed Board of Adjustment rather than under the elected Commission.  Lawrence County has allowed their approval of a mining CUP to be referred in the past and the public rejected the mine’s  approval. Some decisions of County Commissions can be referred, but none of those of  the Boards of Adjustments.

We (PHAS) are concerned about all land use management, but especially the approval of new mines, which in Lawrence County need a CUP. This adds an extra layer of protection and local control to Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources mine permitting/licensing process, as the mine must be approved by both Lawrence County and DANR.  See Lawrence County’s Extractive Industries CUP terms: https://codelibrary.amlegal.com/codes/lawrencecounty/latest/lawrencecty_sd_land/0-0-0-3178#JD_TitleIIChapter20   Only counties with zoning can achieve this authority over hard-rock mining.

More information about referendum effort that was sent to us by petition circulators can be found here – https://phas-wsd.org/wp-content/uploads/Note-on-Referendum-Ord-24-05-Lawrence-Cnty.pdf.

For now, for more information also go to our alert on November 26th about Lawrence County Commission’s meeting.  https://phas-wsd.org/event/lawrence-county-commission-2nd-reading-of-ordinance-24-05/

Contact persons for referendum  in Lawrence County are Les Wolf –  les.wolff@icloud.com, 605-848-4050 or Kristin Wing at 713-542-7559, kawing2218@gmail.com.

Places/Times to sign petitions:

Rosalie Aslesen will be at the coffee shop Ruby’s Roost on Thursday, December 12, from 10:00 am to 12:00 noon with petitions for people to sign.  Ruby’s Roost is located on Jackson, close to the corner of Main Street.

There will also be petitions to sign at a Democratic Party meeting – LCDems Monthly Meeting – Wednesday, December 11 · 7:00 – 8:30 pm at Lewies in Lead, SD, For info – <sodakdemocrats31@gmail.com>

Petitions return

We don’t yet know time of day when petitions need to be returned by and to whom, but we will update this post with more information when we have it.